


The Adventures of Tiny Astrid

by TheBatchild



Series: Treasures of Durin [2]
Category: The Hobbit (2012)
Genre: Pre-Movie, Prequel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-05
Updated: 2013-04-18
Packaged: 2017-12-07 12:36:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 15
Words: 16,078
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/748570
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheBatchild/pseuds/TheBatchild
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It’s amazing the amount of havoc one tiny little girl can cause when she’s bored.  (Prequel to Treasures Lost and Found.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Arrival

**Author's Note:**

> So I've never really written children before, so this might be a little weird, but I can't learn if I don't try. Also, Astrid's not your normal five year old. Also, this fic may be a little disjointed, but I wrote it for fun and just to give a bit of a look at the history between Astrid and Kili and how it'll change their relationship later on.

The dwarf settlement in the foothills of the Blue Mountains wasn’t spectacular or grand like the halls left behind in Moria and Erebor, but it was well-established and, once you were welcomed, a rather warm and comforting place to be. 

The traveling tinker Bran had a long-standing business relationship with the dwarves and had been welcome for quite some time, and the same courtesy was extended to his wife Hild, and their daughter when they joined him. Currently, their wagons were parked on the edge of the settlement, close enough to be safe, but far enough way to not disturb the ebb and flow of the dwarves who lives there. The tinker and his wife were engaged in business, and their five year-old daughter Astrid, smaller than the average human like her parents, had been left to the care of Dis and a couple other dwarf women, their careful eyes watching the few dwarf children of the settlement and the human girl. 

Or they would have been watching the human child, had she not picked her moment and slipped away.

Astrid ducked under a table and crawled away from the area where they’d been playing, darting around the corner of the first building she came to; they had only just arrived in the Blue Mountains the day before and already she was bored. She giggled to herself and looked around for something interesting, anything more engaging than the games the dwarf children had been playing. She wanted to explore, to find places to hide, things to collect, things to see that she had never seen before.

Somewhere to her right she heard laughter. That seemed like a good place to start. 

“Where do you think you’re going little one?” someone asked, sweeping her off her feet as she made for the noise. 

Astrid flailed and wiggled, trying to get free, small groans of protest escaping her lips. She stopped the frantic movements when her captor turned her around. He was a dwarf, someone she’d never met and at first she was a little scared. He had no hair on the top of his head, just tattoos, and what hair he did have stuck out above his ears and covered his shoulders, joining almost seamlessly with his beard. He was smiling and the smile set her at ease.

“Who are you?” she asked, bunching her lips and narrowing her eyes as he adjusted his hold on her to something more comfortable. She fastened her little fists onto his shirt.

The dwarf laughed, a loud noise that Astrid liked. She laughed too. “My name is Dwalin.”

“Dwalin,” she repeated carefully. “Dwalin.”

“Very good, little one.”

“That’s not my name.”

Dwalin laughed again and Astrid smiled, though she tried to keep the look of displeasure on her face. “What is your name then?”

“Astrid,” she stated proudly. “Daughter of Bran and Hild. And I was going over there.” She pointed towards the sounds of laughter and what sounded like metal banging against metal. “I want to see what’s making that noise and who is laughing.” 

Dwalin started walking towards the noises. “It is just some foolish young dwarves,” he said when they reached the side of the practice arena. 

The tiny human girl wiggled out of Dwalin’s grasp and approached the arena slowly, stopping exactly where the grass turned to dirt, the toes of her shoes meeting the line and her hands clasped behind her back. Dwalin remained close behind her, his arms crossed over his chest, as she watched the mock sword fight in front of her with rapt attention, her eyes darting between the blond and brunette dwarves. There was a small smile on her face and a light in her eyes. The dwarves who were fighting didn’t look young to her, but they didn’t look as old as Dwalin either so Astrid didn’t say anything, just enjoyed watching.

Soon enough the two dwarves were finished and they turned to their spectators, wide grins on their faces. They both greeted Dwalin before turning their attention to the human child.

“And who is this?” the blond one asked, crouching in front of Astrid. 

The question was directed at Dwalin, but the girl answered for herself, cross her arms in front of her. “My name is Astrid, and you can talk to me.”

The other one laughed as he knelt. “It’s nice to meet you Astrid. I’m Kili and this is my brother Fili.”

“Kili and Fili. Kili. Fili.” She nodded once to herself, satisfied that she had their names down. “Your names sound the same.”

The brothers laughed and Astrid smiled up at them. Fili reached forward to ruffle her hair but she ducked under his hand and batted ineffectually at his hand, which prompted more laughter. Astrid tried to look upset, but she couldn’t keep the grin off her face. 

“Astrid!” a dwarf woman cried, running up to the practice field. She swept the girl into her arms. “There you are! What in Durin’s name are you doing all the way over here?” Her dark eyes found Dwalin, Fili, and Kili and she frowned hard, disapproval all over her face. 

“Dis,” Astrid whined, after a moment of trying to recall the dwarf woman’s name. “Dis, I do not want to go back to play with the dwarf children and I do not want to be picked up!”

Dis ignored the second part. “Child, your mother asked me to keep my eye on you. I do not think she would appreciate it if I were to let you watch my sons pretend to beat each other senseless.”

Astrid’s face bunched in confusion and she looked between Dis and the trio of male dwarves. “But it is more fun here.”

Dis rolled her eyes and started back towards where Astrid had started her little quest. Looking far more put-out than the situation called for, Astrid waved at Dwalin, Fili, and Kili over Dis’s shoulder. She laughed when Fili and Kili made silly faces at her and waved again in earnest.


	2. Little Things

Astrid’s obedience of her mother’s wish to remain where Dis could see her lasted for half of the next day. 

She played with the dwarf children and behaved herself until she noticed Dis’s attention was elsewhere. After quickly checking for any other sets of eyes on her, Astrid slipped behind a nearby tree and started off through the village at a quick jog, ducking behind carts or crates, trees or buildings—whatever would help her hide. It didn’t take too long for her to get well out of Dis’s range of vision. Once she was sure she wouldn’t be caught, the little girl walked freely along the street, looking around and trying to take as much in as she could. 

The dwarves largely ignored her, though some looked at her curiously and some gave her a small smile. One dwarf asked her if she was lost, and she politely told him no, she wasn’t and continued on her way, leaving the dwarf shaking his head in her wake. She hoped no one would tell Dis where she was. 

Astrid walked until she was away from the centre of the town and she could run through the grass and bushes, chasing squirrels and smelling the flowers she’d never seen before. She was contemplating eating some of the red berries she’d found—they sure looked like strawberries, but maybe she shouldn’t eat them, just in case…—when she heard the metal-on-metal sounds of the sword fight from the day before. Wondering if it was Fili and Kili again, Astrid struck out for the noise, watching carefully for anyone else who might have been training. The year before, when the caravan had been in Rohan, she’d almost been impaled because she’d wandered too close to a training field. 

She passed several dwarves training with various weapons and she paused briefly to watch all of them in turn, the movement and noise capturing her attention. Eventually, she did find Fili and Kili at it again. She sat on the ground with her back against a nearby tree and pulled her legs up to her chest, arms wrapped around her knees as she watched. They weren’t laughing as they sparred today, and she wasn’t sure they’d even noticed as she sat down. She didn’t mind. 

After a few minutes, she noticed a pile of leather and weapons sitting to her right and though she knew she probably shouldn’t touch them, her curiosity got the better of her. She shuffled across the ground and started picking through the pile carefully, avoiding the sharp edges of the knives. Astrid laid all the knives out in a neat row—there were a lot of them—and then picked up the quiver full of arrows, a bow strung around the container. She’d always been fascinated with archery; her mother was quite good at it and Astrid loved watching and helping Hild retrieve the spent arrows. She pulled the arrows from the quiver and examined them closely, trying to remember what the different parts were called. 

She tired quickly of that and decided hiding the knives and arrows would be more fun. 

Grinning mischievously to herself, Astrid looked over her shoulder to verify Fili and Kili were still engaged in their sparring—Fili was now trying to teach Kili a different way to block—before she began. One of the knives and two of the arrows went under the bushes nearby, tucked under the foliage. 

She gathered as many of the knives as she could and started dropping them between rocks, balancing them on low-hanging branches, slipping them under more bushes, grinning all the while. The little girl didn’t venture very far away, but she managed to finish hiding the knives and get a few steps away with the arrows before she was spotted. 

“What are you doing with those?” Kili asked as he and Fili approached. 

She froze in place, her green eyes wide and darting between the brothers. “Uh…”

“Where are my knives?” 

Astrid looked at Fili and pressed her lips together as she shrugged. She let Kili take the arrows from her arms and stood with her hands clasped in front of her as she chewed her bottom lip. 

Kili crouched down to return the arrows to his quiver, his eyes moving to the bush she’d first hid the weapons under. He fished the arrows and knife out and handed the blade to his brother. “Did you hide Fili’s knives?” Kili asked her, amusement in his voice. 

She shrugged again, but she couldn’t keep the smile off her face.

Fili sighed. “I am starting to see why Mother was so keen on keeping an eye on you.” He crouched down so he could look her in the eye. “Where did you put my knives?”

The smile grew and she laughed and pointed to the closest spot where one of the blades was hidden. Kili watched his brother retrieve the single blade hidden in the tree and joined Astrid in her laughter when he looked at her and frowned, clearly not amused at the prospect of having to hunt down his weapons. Fili returned to where Astrid and Kili were sitting and once again crouched in front of the human girl, any trace of laughter that might have been in his eyes gone. 

“Why did you hide my knives?” he asked, the tone of his voice telling Astrid she was about to get in trouble. It was similar to the tone her father used when she had done something she shouldn’t have. 

“It was fun,” she said, dropping her eyes to the ground. “And I was bored.” 

“It was just a harmless prank Fili.” 

He turned his eyes to his brother. “You would not be laughing so hard had she managed to hide your arrows all over the place.”

“Yes, well, we stopped her before she could do that, so I get to laugh.” Kili smiled at his brother and then at Astrid, who giggled even though she was still trying to look appropriately shamed. 

They won over Fili though, his lips parting in a chuckle. “I don’t suppose you will help me find the knives?” 

“That would be no fun,” Astrid informed him quite seriously. She smiled at him, the same mischievous smile she’d had earlier. “You have to find them on your own.” 

“Of course. Will you at least tell me if I am getting close?”

“Kili can help you find them!”

The brothers rolled their eyes, but they were still laughing. Astrid watched as they began their hunt for the knives and when she was sure they were occupied enough to miss her actions, she carefully slid Kili’s arrows back of the quiver and skittered off in the opposite direction, sticking the arrows in the hiding places available to her quickest and easiest, careful not to snap the shafts. It was Fili who caught her, just as she was placing the last couple arrows in the bend of a tree branch. She gave a shriek of wild laughter and started running back towards the village, Fili and Kili’s yells of protest following her.


	3. Thief

“Astrid, you need to stop wandering away. Your father and I have business to conduct away from the wagons for at least a few more days and we cannot keep an eye on you. You have to stay where Dis can see you.”

“But Mother, the games the dwarf children play are boring! I want to explore the village and—”

“You cannot go off and annoy Dis’s sons again. They have responsibilities and duties of they own to see to, and your stunt yesterday delayed them from important business.”

Astrid remained silent and stared hard at the floor of the wagon, her feet folded under the bench and her fingers wrapped tightly around the edge of it. Her mother had been scolding her for the better part of fifteen minutes and though she felt guilty for keeping Fili and Kili from whatever it was they had had to do yesterday, she couldn’t help but feel she was being unfairly punished—Fili and Kili had been laughing about her prank—but she couldn’t tell her mother that. 

“Are you listening to me?”

She looked up and found her mother’s dark eyes boring into her. Astrid almost looked at the floor again. “Yes mother.”

“When your father and I return to the wagons, you can stay with us.”

Astrid nodded, the prospect only slightly more interesting than staying with Dis and the dwarf children. She enjoyed helping her parents sell things, helping her mother bake, her father tend weapons and mend things, but they were in a new place and she wanted to explore. 

“You will stay where Dis can see you today,” Hild said, drawing Astrid’s attention back to the moment. 

“Yes mother,” she mumbled. 

So, after she had eaten her breakfast and dressed for the day, Astrid followed her mother along the now-familiar path to Dis’s house, trying her best to keep from looking around. If she saw something interesting, she’d want to run off and investigate and she was at least somewhat determined to obey her mother today. Inside the house, she sat on a chair in front of the fireplace as Hild went to talk to speak to the dwarf woman. Astrid stared into the fire and sighed, slumping down in the chair as she did. She was pouting, but she felt as if the remainder of their visit to the Blue Mountains was going to be quite boring. 

“Astrid?”

She sat upright and smiled at Fili, who looked as if he had just woken up. “Hi Fili!” 

He blinked slowly at her. “What are you doing in my house?”

“My mother is talking to Dis,” she said, looking towards the other room where the women could be heard conversing in low voices. “I don’t think either of them is very happy with me.” 

“Do not be too upset little one,” Fili said, ruffling her hair. 

She stuck her tongue out at him as he walked passed her. Her eyes caught sight of something sticking out of his pocket and without much thought, she lifted it carefully free. Fili didn’t notice. Clutching her prize—Fili’s pipe, as it turned out—Astrid sunk back down into the chair and examined it, running her fingers over the intricate carvings. She held it close to her face and inhaled the residual scent of whatever plant had last been in the bowl of the pipe, deep and dark and a little bitter. It was the same smell as the pipeweed her father sometimes used. With a small grin, she slid out of the chair and walked in the direction she’d seen Fili go, planning on returning the pipe to him. 

He was just coming out of the kitchen when she found him. The dwarf spotted his pipe in Astrid’s hands and he frowned, as if he was trying to figure out how it had gotten there. He started towards her, reaching out to take the pipe back, but Astrid, struck with that wild inspiration again, took a few steps backwards before she spun and ran through the halls, giggling when she heard Fili following. 

“Give that back!”

She laughed again and ducked into the first open room she came across, looking over her shoulder to see how close Fili was. With her eyes otherwise occupied, she ran full tilt into something solid and warm and tumbled to the ground and, at the same moment, a cry went up from Fili as he misjudged his speed and caught his foot on the doorframe, a loud crack sounding. 

Astrid rolled onto her side and scrambled to her feet, the pipe still clutched in one hand, and surveyed what had happened. She had crashed into Kili, who was still lying on the floor, his head and shoulders propped off the ground as he looked towards his brother, concern on his face. Fili was sitting in the doorway, holding his foot. Astrid could see blood and a very large and purple toe.

She crossed the room and knelt beside Fili, sticking the pipe back in his pocket as she did so. Before she could say anything however, Dis and Hild came up the hall, their faces twisted in near identical expressions of confusion and worry. 

“What happened?” Dis asked, looking from her boys to Astrid. 

Tears itched at the corners of Astrid’s eyes, but luckily she didn’t have to try and find the words for an explanation. 

“Astrid and I were playing,” Fili said, his eyes never leaving the little girl. “And I caught my toe on the doorframe when I tried to follow. That is all. I will be fine.”

She sniffed back her tears and smiled at Fili as Kili came and helped him to his feet. He reached down to ruffle her hair again and she laughed.


	4. Entwined

As it turned out, staying where Dis could see her wasn’t the worst thing Astrid could have been punished with. Realizing she just needed to be kept busy, Dis started finding things for her to do, away from the normal activities of the young dwarf children. Astrid helped Dis prepare fish and meat for cooking, learned how to build a proper fire in the hearth, started learning some dwarvish phrases as she followed Dis around, sat quietly and listened to Dis’s stories of the heroes of the dwarves, and of their exile from Erebor. Dis found some books Astrid could immerse herself in as well, which usually kept Astrid occupied for at least two hours. Astrid seemed to enjoy the company of adults over children her own age. Since she travelled with only her parents, this was not surprising, though it was a little sad.

It would have, however, taken something unearthly to keep Astrid occupied for longer than the few hours the books managed to hold her attention. She’d been good for a few days, but she was itching to continue exploring on her own. So, as soon as Dis was busy with something and she’d finished her current book, Astrid snuck out through the kitchen, the door propped open to let the spring air in.

She took a deep breath once she was free of the house and pulled the leather cord out of her hair, letting it blow about her face and shoulders in the breeze. She ran across the grass, back towards the trees and the river where she’d helped Dis wash some blankets the day before yesterday. Astrid may have not had a great memory for most things, but she remembered the path to take to the riverbank with no issue. When she could smell the water, and hear it bubbling over the stones, she slowed to a walk and started humming to herself, snippets of a tune she’d heard some dwarves singing the day before. The day was warm and she was happy. 

Her happiness was replaced with devious energy upon spotting Fili and Kili on the opposite bank, farther down the river. They were lying with their feet in the water, their upper bodies on the grass. Their heavy leather coats and boots were piled beside them, along with the few knives they wore around the village. Fili was lying on his side, his back to his brother. Kili was on his back, his hands folded on his chest and his mouth hanging slack. They were asleep.

She let the smirk take over her face and slid as slowly, quietly as she could manage into the water. It was cold, but not terribly so, and she made her way across the river, being careful of her footing on the slippery rocks and sand. Astrid made it across without too much splashing and the dwarves remained asleep; she recalled Dis saying something about her boys disappearing when there were chores to be done at home and she had a sneaking suspicion she’d just found said place. She wondered if the information would come in handy later.

She climbed up onto the bank and walked around Fili and Kili until she could sit down above their heads. Making sure none of her wet clothing would drip on the brothers, she reached forward and took some of Kili’s hair in one hand, and Fili’s in the other. Her tongue poked out between her lips as she tried to remember the steps to braiding and did her best to not pull too hard or do anything else that would wake the sleeping dwarves. 

Kili snorted and wiggled a bit deeper into the grass. Astrid pressed her lips together around a smile, tried not to laugh too loudly. Fili remained quite still, though he did make some interesting noises, syllables that sounded almost like he was trying to speak. 

Giggling softly, Astrid started braiding their hair together. Thankfully, both of them had hair long enough to cover the short distance between their heads and have some left over to be braided. Just to be sure though, Astrid put several braids in their hair, as many as she could manage. She went so far as to remove the square silver clasps Fili and Kili wore to hold half their hair back from their faces, giving her more blond and brunette locks to play with. Briefly she considered putting the clasps in her pocket and hiding them somehow, but decided to leave them in the grass by Kili’s head. 

When her work was done and the brothers were as attached as they were going to get via their hair, Astrid crossed back over the river and pulled herself into the bushes, heedless of the mud collecting on her wet clothes and the leaves sticking in her hair. 

“Fili! Kili!” she called, raising her voice to hopefully cut through the deep slumber the dwarves were apparently capable of. 

Kili was the first to stir. He yawned and moved to sit up. When his hair pulled, he gave a small yelp, more from surprise than pain; a noise echoed by a cry from Fili when the braids tugged at his head. Astrid covered her mouth to keep her laughter quiet. Fili and Kili frantically tried to figure out what was going on. It looked like they were beginning to panic in their sleepy mindsets. It was Fili who noticed the braids connecting them. 

“Kili, Kili—stop moving!”

Astrid’s laughter burst passed her hands and the brothers both turned towards the noise. It might have been a threatening gesture, had they not tried to turn in opposite directions. The braids pulled tight and they both gave short cries of pain. Astrid let go of any pretense of hiding her laughter, the peals loud and clear. 

“Astrid!” Kili yelled, anger plain in his voice.

She laughed louder, watching them fight to untangle themselves. It didn’t take the brothers very long once they figured out what was going on, and soon enough they were splashing across the river towards Astrid’s hiding spot. With a playful shriek, she scrambled out from under the bushes and started running. However, Astrid wasn’t fast enough. One of the brothers caught her, hooking his arms under his and sweeping her off the ground. For a moment she was airborne and spinning and then she was looking at Fili from his arms. There was a big grin on her face already, one she exaggerated upon seeing the displeasure on Fili’s face.

Behind his brother, Kili snorted as he tried to stifle his laughter and Astrid giggled again. Fili set her down on the ground. She thought about running off, but looked up at the dwarves instead, clasping her hands behind her back and trying to look apologetic. 

Fili squeezed his eyes shut and pinched the bridge of his nose between his thumb and forefinger as he sighed. “We had better get you back to the village,” he said finally. “Your mother and mine will be in a state.”

Astrid frowned, but knew there was no use arguing. She’d had her fun. So, she fell into step between Fili and Kili, the latter of which reached down and ruffled her hair. 

“You are quite the troublemaker, little one,” he said. 

“That’s not my name!”


	5. Big Green Eyes

“No need to fret Dis, here she is. It seems your sons found her alive an in one piece, though covered in mud.” 

Astrid smiled and waved at Dwalin, who returned the gesture. She hadn’t spoken to the big dwarf since her first day in the settlement, though she had seen him in passing when she’d been helping Dis carry food back to the house. The little girl actually took a few steps towards Dwalin before she felt Dis’s eyes on her. He gave a small chuckle as Astrid’s exuberance withered under Dis’s glare, though she need not have worried. Dis’s wrath was mostly for her sons—her worry was for Astrid, who, covered in mud and leaves as she was, looked as if she’d been through some ordeal. 

“Astrid! Are you all right? You were there in the kitchen one minute and then you were gone—I shouldn’t have left the door open.” Dis crouched in front of the young girl, pulled some of the leaves from her hair. “What in Durin’s name happened?” Her eyes went to her sons. “What did you two do?”

“Us?” Kili barked. “We did nothing!”

“I found them sleeping by the river,” Astrid said. There was no malicious intent in her voice—she was just relaying the facts. “I braided their hair together while they slept and then yelled to wake them up—it was funny. I had to cross the river to get to them, and I got muddy when I sat on the riverbank. The leaves came from hiding in the bushes.”

Dwalin burst out into laughter, either at the frankness of Astrid’s explanation or her actual actions—or maybe both—but he quieted when Dis turned her eyes on him. Still smiling, he crossed his arms over his chest. Dis looked at her sons next, and both of them withered, but she didn’t say anything to them. Not yet, anyway. She turned back to Astrid, some of that anger leaking into her features. 

“You have to stop sneaking off Astrid,” Dis said with a seriousness Astrid’s mother couldn’t match, a seriousness that actually made her stop and think. Hild was usually just relived to find Astrid in one piece; it was her father who got angry, though it didn’t happen that often, since Astrid didn’t stray far from the wagons while they were on the road. Her wandering only occurred when they were in a village or a city, when there were other people around. “We live in the mountains—there are wild animals that will hurt you if you get too close, and there are plenty of places where you could fall and seriously injure yourself. Or you might get lost if you continue to wander off towards the forest. It is very dangerous.”

Astrid looked at the ground, her hands clasped tightly in front of her. When she looked back up at Dis, her green eyes were shimmering, but she didn’t let herself cry. “I’m sorry Dis. I was bored and… wanted to get outside again.”

Dis pushed some of Astrid’s hair back from her face and pulled some more of the leaves free as she gave her a faint smile. “I know, little one.”

Astrid returned the smile. “That’s not my name.”

Dwalin’s deep laughter sounded again. “Quite the fire in this one,” he said, something sounding an awful lot like an edge of sadness creeping into his voice. Astrid looked between Dis and Dwalin and they shared a strange look, but she didn’t have the opportunity to ask what was up.

“What about the part where she braided our hair together?” Fili interjected. 

“I am tempted to call that your punishment for ignoring your chores yet again,” Dis said, earning a string of protests from both her boys—words she cut off with the simple motion of rising to her feet. “Go do your chores now and I will forget it this time.” The left with more grumbling—Astrid thought she heard something about her only getting out of trouble because of her big green eyes, but she couldn’t be sure—but they went nevertheless. “Astrid,” she said once Fili and Kili were gone. “I have to tell your parents about this.”

Astrid nodded, though her cheeks flushed and tears prickled at her eyes. Her parents were already unhappy she’d been causing so much havoc, but Fili and Kili were so much fun to play around with. “I was just looking for some fun,” she said. 

“I understand that, but you need to find less disruptive ways to entertain yourself.”

“Let me watch the lass,” Dwalin said. “I will find her tasks to keep her busy.”

Astrid looked up hopefully, but Dis was frowning. “I would discuss that with her parents were I you. I do not think they would want her around the furnaces and forges and training fields.”

“She is the daughter of a tinker, Dis. I am sure she is familiar with weapons.”

“I want to stay with Dwalin! I like helping my father fix weapons!”

Dis looked vaguely alarmed at the words, but said nothing about it. She also ignored the smug look from Dwalin. “I will let you take it up with Bran and Hild,” she said. “They were in the market last I knew.”

Dwalin smiled, weathering the look Dis was giving him, a look of doubt and trepidation. “Do not look at me like that. I took care of Nerys when she was young, and she was as handful as well.”

“So you keep telling me.” Dis looked down at Astrid and then back at Dwalin. “Just be sure to keep her out of my brother’s way.”

“Of course.”

Dis crouched in front of Astrid again and gave her a stern look. “If your parents agree to let Dwalin watch you, make sure you listen to him.”

Astrid nodded. “I am sorry to have caused you trouble,” she said earnestly. “I don’t mean to.”

“I know, I know, but where Dwalin works, it is very dangerous.” 

“I will be good.”

Dis smiled at her warmly before rising and, with one last look at Dwalin, she returned to her house, presumably to keep an eye on her boys and make sure the chores were actually getting done. 

“Come on, little on,” Dwalin said. “Let us find your parents.”

Astrid fell in step beside Dwalin as he started walking. She pulled the rest of the leaves from her hair and then reached up to wrapped her hand around as many of Dwalin’s fingers as she could.


	6. The Dwarf Prince

It took some convincing, but Astrid’s parents agreed to let Dwalin watch her while they finished their business; it was taking much longer than expected for a variety of reasons the little girl didn’t understand. Hild needed more convincing than her husband, but Bran had known Dwalin for far longer than his wife. The tinker and travelling merchant had heard a few stories of Dwalin’s younger sister and the way he’d help to raise her, and he was confident the dwarf would be able to keep Astrid busy and out of trouble, despite her reckless behaviour; the increase in recklessness was something her parents still hadn’t figured out, though they suspect it had something to do with Fili and Kili’s responsiveness to her pranks. 

Regardless of why she had become more of a handful than normal, Dwalin proved to be a natural at keeping her calm and occupied. 

The morning after the incident with the braids, Astrid found herself in one of the numerous forges in the village, standing on a wooden stool beside Dwalin as he heated a piece of metal in the glowing embers of the furnace. She was holding a smaller version of the hammer in Dwalin’s own hands and watching with rapt attention as the metal turned re-orange like the embers beneath it. 

They’d spent the first part of the morning sorting through the materials in the shop, with Astrid organizing them into piles and Dwalin putting them away. Then, she had demonstrated her ability to stoke a fire to life, even one so large as the blaze heating the smithy, though Dwalin had had to assist her at points, and he’d kept a very close eye on her. Now, when Dwalin would pull the metal from the fire, she would help hammer it into shape. Her hammer blows were rather ineffectual, but she didn’t give up, and Dwalin encouraged her to his as hard as she could—he would fix any resulting mistakes. 

In a further attempt to keep Astrid’s mind occupied, Dwalin was recounting tales of the battles he’d fought in as they worked. The stories of war seemed to interest the girl a great deal.

“Dwalin,” she said when they’d finished the current round of hammering and Dwalin had tempered the blade with cold water. “Dis told me a story about a dragon attacking a dwarf city. Is that a true story?”

The dwarf looked up from examining the soon-to-be sword. “What makes you think that?”

Astrid shrugged and put the hammer head down on the workbench behind them. She leaned on it and wiped the sweat from her face. “When Dis told the story, she sounded sad.”

Dwalin sighed, ran a hand over his bald head. “Aye,” he said, placing the metal back in the fire. “It’s a true story.”

“Where you there?”

Dwalin was silent for so long Astrid thought he wasn’t going to answer. She was beginning to regret the question when Dwalin cleared his throat as he turned the metal over. 

“I was there when the dragon attacked.” He fell silent again and pulled the red-hot metal from the flames. He hammered it and then plunged it into the water. For a moment, his face was obscured by the steam. “Smaug destroyed Erebor and the city of Dale that sat at the foot of the mountain. Many lives were lost and no one came to our aid.” He shook his head and smiled a sad smile at Astrid. “You remind me of my younger sister when she was quite small.”

Astrid bit her lip as she frowned, overcome by a sudden wave of emotion. “Did she die when Sm… Smaug attacked?” she asked tentatively, stumbling over the dragon’s name.

Dwalin nodded as he picked up the metal again and placed it on the heat. “Yes, little one, she did. Her name was Nerys—”

“Dwalin.”

The new voice startled Astrid enough that she knocked over her hammer. She climbed off the stool to retrieve it and found herself standing in front of another dwarf, one she’d never seen before. He was shorter than Dwalin, but somehow seemed for formidable. It might have been the unhappy look on his face, his long black hair, or the heavy dark robes he wore, but the new dwarf intimidated Astrid. She didn’t back away though. She set her jaw and looked up at the dwarf.

He returned her stare. “And who are you?” he asked, his voice a deep rumble, deeper than Dwalin’s. 

Astrid was aware of Dwalin chuckling behind her. She climbed back onto the stool so she could more easily look the dwarf in the eyes, after replacing the hammer on the workbench. “I am Astrid, daughter of Bran and Hild. Who are you?” 

The dwarf looked over Astrid’s head at Dwalin and then back at the precocious little girl in front of him, his mouth quirking in what might have been amusement. “Thorin, son of Thrain, and leader of this settlement.” 

She narrowed her eyes as if attempting to determine the truth of his claim. Then she nodded and looked to Dwalin, who was chuckling quietly. When she looked back at Thorin, there was a small smile on his face. “What?”

“Astrid, Thorin is the prince of the dwarves,” Dwalin said. 

She looked him over carefully; with the small grin on his face, Thorin was much less intimidating. “You don’t look like a prince.”

“Should I wear a crown?”

Astrid shrugged. “Is that not what princes do?”

Thorin laughed, the smile lighting up his face; he didn’t look so intimidating when he smiled and Astrid relaxed a bit. “I suppose you are correct, Astrid.” 

Astrid nodded her satisfaction as Thorin moved past her to stand closer to Dwalin. They spoke of something in quick, hushed words Astrid couldn’t understand, though she tried. She thought they were speaking dwarvish. When Thorin stepped back, he gave Astrid another smile and reached down to ruffle her hair.

“I do wish people would stop doing that,” she sighed.


	7. The Blunt Side

“Dwalin, will you tell me more about the dragon?”

The dwarf looked down at the little girl as she dropped another shield on the pile she’d been gathering for the past few minutes. They were on the trailing fields today, preparing for when those learning how to fight would arrive. “I told you not to ask about that anymore, little one.”

“But I want to know what happened!” 

“No more questions about it, Astrid. If that is not something you can manage, you can go and help your parents like you were supposed to once their business was finished.”

Since Astrid wanted to stay and help Dwalin with tasks she considered much more interesting, she clamped her mouth shut and looked up at him, her green eyes wide and shimmering a little bit. “I will stop asking,” she muttered. “What would you have me do next?”

Dwalin sighed and directed her to make sure all the quivers were full and ready to be used. She settled herself on the grass in front of where the wooden quivers were lined up and began distributing the remaining arrows between them until the pile was gone. By the time she was finished, some of the dwarves Dwalin would be teaching had shown up and they were gathering their swords and shields about themselves to begin practicing. Astrid knew the swords were dulled so injury would be minimal, but they still looked deadly glinting in the sunlight. 

“What are you doing here little one?” Fili asked, coming up beside her.

“That is not my name,” she replied, climbing to her feet. “And I am helping Dwalin.”

“You would rather be out here than helping your parents?” 

Astrid started as Kili came up around the other side of her. She narrowed her eyes up at him. “Yes. I help my parents all the time. This is new. This is fun.” She looked over the quivers one more time before she turned on her heel and marched back to where Dwalin stood, surveying the young dwarf men as they warmed up. “Dwalin,” she said as she climbed onto the bench beside him. The added height put the top of her head a little higher than his shoulder. “Why are there no dwarf women learning to fight?”

Dwalin raised an eyebrow as he looked down at her, but she wasn’t looking at him. She was watching the dwarves on the field as they paired off and began running through sword and shield drills. Fili and Kili were close by, but there was no laughter as they sparred today. They were all business. 

“There are not many dwarf women,” Dwalin said. “So, if we have to go to battle, they stay where they are safe. They know how to protect themselves, but most do not put themselves in danger if they do not have to.”

Astrid did look at him then, her eyes wide again. “Did your sister fight?”

“Aye, little one, she did.” Dwalin met her eyes. “But we said no more questions about the past. Do you think you could bring me my axes? One at a time and be careful of the blades.”

Astrid nodded. She knew Dwalin was just giving her something to do—his axes were leaning against a tree not that far away—and to keep her form asking more questions. There was no malicious intent behind the questions about the dragon and Dwalin’s sister. Astrid was just curious. She liked hearing stories about battles and adventures, and she liked hearing legends from the different cultures. The wagon containing her bed was growing more and more full of books her parents bought her while they travelled. But how often did you get to meet someone who had actually seen a dragon? 

She picked up the first axe, both hands wrapped tightly around the handle and started back towards Dwalin, being sure to keep the blade well away from her shoulder or face. The axe was heavy and suddenly she was glad she didn’t have far to walk. The big dwarf took the axe from her in one hand and nodded his thanks as she turned and went back for the other one. This one felt even heavier and Astrid’s hands slipped a bit as she struggled to keep in in her grasp.

A cry went up from the sparring dwarves as Astrid neared Dwalin once again. She looked up just as the axe slipped from her hands.

And landed on Dwalin’s foot. 

Astrid yelped in shock as Dwalin yelled and hastily pulled the axe away, dragging it along the ground. “Dwalin! I am sorry! Are you hurt?” Tears stung her eyes as she looked up at him.

“I am fine Astrid,” he said, sitting on the bench. “It landed on the flat, not the blade. It just smarts is all.”

A couple tears trickled down her cheeks, her bottom lip sticking out as she tried not to cry. “I tried to hang on but—“

He reached down and ruffled her hair. “Do not cry, little one. It was an accident.”

“It could have cut your foot! Chopped off your toes!”

A low chuckle came from Dwalin’s throat. Fili and Kili and some of the others had gathered around to see what all the noise was about. “Neither of those things happened, Astrid. Come here.” She set the axe down on the ground and moved closer to Dwalin, who leaned forward and picked her up, setting her on the bench beside him. Using his thumb, he brushed the tears from her cheeks. “Do not cry.”

“What happened Dwalin? Did your beard scare her?” Fili asked, voice light. 

The look Dwalin gave the older of the brothers made Astrid giggle. She rubbed at her eyes and leaned into Dwalin’s shoulder. He wrapped a protective arm around her and she continued to giggle. Someone ruffled her hair.

“Do not be afraid to ask for help if you need it, Astrid. We do not want anyone to actually lose some toes.”

Astrid looked up and nodded at Dwalin, her apology still plain on her face. “Are you really not hurt?”

“I am really not hurt.”

Kili looked down and nudged the axe with the toe of his boot. “I guess we should count ourselves lucky it was not the sharp edge.”

“I could still run drills minus some toes, lad. Get back to it.” Dwalin gestured at those who had gathered and they moved back to the field to pick up their drills once again. He gave Astrid another smile and then pushed himself off the bench, testing his weight on the bruised appendage. “Come on then, little one,” he said, taking the axe from the ground and leaning it carefully beside the other one.

Astrid scrambled off the bench and fell in beside Dwalin as he started walking through the field. “What am I going to help you with out here?”

“Well I need someone to tell the lads how to use their swords properly don’t I?”

She grinned. “But that’s your job.”

“Right, well, then I need someone to scold them when they are wrong. Can you manage that?”

“I can try.”

“Good, because I am certainly not leaving you on your own to get into more mischief.”


	8. Sharp Edge

“I am sorry sweet pea, but the apple cakes are all gone, and I do not have the apples needed to make more.” 

Astrid pouted up at her mother. “But I wanted one! I have been looking forward to it all day!”

Under normal circumstances, Astrid might have been able to weather the loss of her mother’s apple cake, but the last few days had not been in her favour. After her parents found out about her dropping the axe on Dwalin’s foot, Hild had ordered her back to the wagons and she had not been allowed to leave unless it was under the supervision of one or both her parents. Even though Dwalin assured them both he was fine and that Astrid had apologized and been very careful for the rest of the day, Hild had had enough. Astrid wasn’t even allowed to play with her toys. She had to help her parents with the trading and purchasing going on from the main wagon. She was allowed to read, but only when there wasn’t work to be done. 

She was miserable, and her mother’s next words did nothing to help the situation. 

“Dis’s boys bought up the last bunch just a few moments ago.”

Astrid huffed and marched to the back of the wagon to throw herself on her bed. For some reason, the idea that Fili and Kili had brought all six of the final batch of apple cakes made her even angrier. They didn’t need three each. It wasn’t fair. 

She pouted for a while and then decided she was going to do something about it. She didn’t know what yet, but it wasn’t as if she ever planned her mischief very far in advance. When she was sure her parents were occupied, Astrid slipped out of the wagon and started along the path into town, staying out of the line of sight. 

It was late afternoon, so the first place Astrid looked for the dwarf brothers was the training fields. They were not there, so she snuck quietly away and headed for the river, where she’d braided their hair together. 

To her devious delight, they were sleeping on the river bank again, sprawled on the grass and dirt, their coats bunched beneath their heads and their silver hair clasps glinting in the sunshine. As she carefully crossed the river—it was much easier the second time—she considered braiding their hair together again and maybe affixing it with some tree sap or honey if she could find any. But then she saw the knife in Kili’s belt on the grass and she had a better idea.

Or a worse idea. 

Astrid wrung out the hem of her shirt several paces away from Fili and Kili and did the same with her hair. It would not do to have them wake up in the middle of what she was planning. Significantly dry, she walked back to the sleeping dwarves. She crouched beside Kili’s things and withdrew the knife from its sheath on the belt. 

Without another thought, she crawled to Fili’s side and gingerly picked up one the braids adorning his head. She put the blade against the hair and was pleased to find it was sharp; the hair split easily and soon, she had three of Fili’s braids lying in the ground. She would have cut one of the braids from his moustache, but he was nearly lying on his face and they were unreachable. Kili had no braids to lop off, so Astrid took a handful of the hair on the side of his head and ran the knife through it. She repeated the process at the back of his head. When she made for her third handful of Kili’s hair, the dwarf began to stir.

Astrid gasped before she could stop herself and backpedaled away from Fili and Kili as they both began to awaken. She slid Kili’s knife into her belt and turned and ran away from the river, back through the trees. It didn’t matter that she’d never been on this side of the river before. All that mattered was getting away. 

“ASTRID!”

She pushed herself forward, spurred by a strange mix of glee and fear. She could hear the boys crashing along in the woods behind her, not that she was moving particularly gracefully either, but she was faster. 

Astrid spotted a tree with a low hanging branch and, without thought, scrambled up it, grabbing for the branch when it was in range. She kept climbing and laughed when she heard Fili and Kili below her. 

“Astrid, come back down!”

She wrapped her arms securely around the trunk of the tree and turned her head to yell back at them. Instead, she froze. She was much higher than she’d thought. Much, much higher. Fili and Kili looked tiny from where she was. Her knees went weak and her palms sweaty. She sat down on the branch so she wouldn’t fall and held onto the tree like her life depended on it. 

“Astrid!”

“I can’t come down!” she cried, her voice weak and thin.

She watched as Kili and Fili moved closer together and then Fili ran off, back in the direction of the dwarf settlement, hopefully to get help. Tears stung at her eyes and she began to cry, scared of how high she was, that she’d fall, and what would happen when she got back down. If she made it back to the ground in one piece. 

“Hold on Astrid! We will get you down!” Kili yelled. 

“Hurry!” Her voice broke over the word, but she hoped Kili could hear her anyway.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this is the chapter that started it all. Seriously. This was the first moment that came up in conversation about Tiny Astrid and her shenanigans. It’s also probably the craziest. Astrid throws a tantrum and bad things happen. She’s a five year old who doesn’t get to play with other five year olds often, and those she does get to play with can’t keep up. That’s what you get when you travel the world with your parents meeting mostly adults and exploring cities.


	9. Too High

Astrid could hear her mother and Dis and Fili and Kili yelling up at her, but she could no longer tell what they were saying. She could hear her blood rushing and her heart pounding in her ears and all she could think about was how scary it would be to fall. She was shaking and she thought the tree was swaying an awful lot in the wind—wind? There hadn’t been any wind a moment ago and her hair wasn’t moving… She was crying and her eyes were so tightly shut she wasn’t sure she’d ever be able to open them again. 

“ASTRID!” 

The shrill cry from her mother tore another sob from her throat. Moving first one eyelid and then the other, Astrid forced her eyes open, forced herself to look down. The people at the bottom of the tree were blurry through her tears. She gasped and clung to the tree tighter, her cheek pressing into the rough bark. 

“MOMMY! I can’t get down! I can’t move!” Her voice cracked again and the last words came out as no more than a high-pitched whimper.

She didn’t hear a reply, but her eyes had closed again and she didn’t want to look down. She wanted to stop shaking, to feel sturdy ground beneath her feet again. There was some faint shuffling beneath her and what sounded like protests, but Astrid just clung to the bark, her nails chipped and the tips of her fingers scarlet with blood. 

A few moments later, she heard the scrapes and pants of someone else climbing the tree. Soon, the noises were very close, and the branch nearby creaked as it took the weight of someone sitting on it. 

“Astrid.” She forced her eyes open again and found Kili looking at her from his perch on the other branch. He gave her a small smile and reached out a hand towards her. “Let’s get you back down to the ground.”

But she still clung to the tree. “How?”

“All you have to do is put your arms around my neck and hold on. I will climb down.”

Astrid looked at Kili and saw he was just in his tunic, the vest and coat he normally wore absent, probably for ease of climbing. He was still smiling at her, the gesture reassuring. After another moment of deliberation, she nodded and took Kili’s hand with one of hers. Slowly and with words of encouragement from the dwarf, Astrid made it onto the same branch and got her arms around his neck. 

“Not so tight, little one.”

“That’s not my name,” she muttered, her face pressed into the back of his shoulder. 

She felt his laughter more than heard it as he began climbing down the tree. Astrid held on as tight as she dared, her arms around his neck and her legs as far around his middle as they would go, and shut her eyes again. She wasn’t going to look, not until they were back on the ground. 

“I should not have cut your hair,” she said. 

“You are right, though it just hair. It will grow back.”

Astrid remained silent the rest of the way to the ground and her eyes remained shut until Kili told her they were safe. She slid down from his back and remained standing where she was, her knees still shaking slightly. There was a brief moment of silence and stillness and then Hild had her arms wrapped tightly around her daughter and then she was yelling. 

“Are you hurt? You are bleeding! How could you run off? What were you thinking? And you cut the boys’ hair? What has gotten into you Astrid? What could have possibly told you that was a good idea? You were to remain where we could see you—to stay inside—and you ran off and then you—” She stopped yelling and hugged her little girl again. Astrid had begun to cry again, but she hugged her mother back and mumbled over and over again that she was sorry she’d run off and sorry for climbing the tree. “Astrid, Astrid, calm down! We cannot understand you.”

Astrid looked at her mother and took a deep breath. “I am sorry.”

“I know you are, but you have got to stop doing things like this. Your apology will mean nothing if you keep doing things you have to apologize for. And, if you keep running off and causing trouble, someone is going to get seriously injured and it will probably be you. I do not know what has gotten into you, but please, Astrid, stop.”

The little girl found she had no words, so she just nodded, tears still falling down her cheeks. She hugged her mother again and looked at Fili, Kili, and Dis standing a little ways behind Hild. She did her best to offer an apologetic smile though her tears. When her mother let her go, she walked up to trio and looked at the ground. 

“I will stop causing you trouble,” she said, repeating the words her mother had used. “I was mad and bored and I should not have taken it out on you.”

Dis crouched in front of Astrid, the braids coming from behind her ears and dangling from her chin swinging. “Are you all right Astrid?” she asked, taking her hands gingerly in her own. “Your hands and cheek are bleeding.”

“It is just because of the bark. I will be fine.”

Dis cupped Astrid’s unmarked cheek and gave it a little pat. “Good. Your mother is right, you know.”

Astrid nodded and blinked back the last of her tears, because that tone was back in Dis’s voice—the seriousness Astrid found terrifying. Dis gave her another small smile before getting to her feet. Both Kili and Fili ruffled her hair as they passed and then Astrid returned to her mother. Hild picked up her daughter and propped her up on her hip to avoid hurting her hands and cheek any more than they already were. By the time they returned to the wagon, Astrid had fallen asleep, exhausted from the adrenaline and fear and shame.


	10. Accomplice

It was a few days before Astrid was allowed to leave the wagons again. She was in a lot of trouble, so it was her job to scrub the pans from her mother’s cooking and make sure her father’s tools and supplies got put away properly. When Bran brought new supplies back to the wagons, she had to help count and put things away, and she had to help wash down the wagons after a particularly rainy and windy day splattered the boards with mud and leaves. When she wasn’t working with her parents, she slept or read, but did nothing else. 

Unlike her last confinement, this was an all-out punishment, but Astrid wasn’t fighting it. Perhaps it was because she knew she’d done something very wrong, or perhaps it was because she still shook whenever she thought of being up in that tree. 

Whatever the reason, when she was allowed to venture into town with her mother on the third day after the incident, Astrid found herself without the desire to run off and explore. She stayed close to Hild and listened as her mother told her they would be leaving in a few days, heading east through the Shire. Astrid nodded along, but said nothing though her mother seemed to think she would be excited to hear the news. The last time they’d been amongst the Hobbits, Astrid had been barely a year old. She remembered nothing.

It was on the way back when she spotted Fili and Kili outside one of the taverns in the centre of the dwarf village. She stopped walking to watch as Fili spoke to a dwarf woman at the door and Kili, who was around the corner of the building, lifted a pie from the window sill and hurried off down the alley between the buildings. Astrid looked for her mother and found her speaking to one of the dwarf women in the marker not too far away. Astrid carefully set the basket down beside her mother and then hurried back to the tavern, peeking around the corner. Seeing no sign of Kili or Fili, Astrid slipped into the shade of the alley and scurried towards the other end.

She found the dwarves sitting behind the building beside the tavern, the pie on the ground between them. They were laughing around mouthfuls of the dessert—blueberry, by the smell and the purple juice on fingers and chins. 

“You stole that pie,” Astrid said.

Fili and Kili both jumped, identical expressions of surprise on their faces. “So? Are you going to tell the innkeeper?” Kili asked.

“Shouldn’t I?”

The blond brother pointed at Astrid. “You owe us for cutting our hair.”

Astrid frowned at Fili, but nodded and dropped onto the ground beside them. After a moment where they remained still, Fili and Kili started eating the pie again, casting furtive glances at the little girl. Just as they were finishing the pie, Astrid heard her mother calling her name, the tone slightly panicked and angry. 

“You had better go.”

“I do not want to go back to the wagons,” Astrid said, even as she got to her feet. She brushed off her dress—she hated wearing the skirts, but her mother had made her—and started back towards market. “We are baking today. Would you like me to bring you some more apple cakes?” She felt maybe baked goods would help get her apology across, help make her feel better as well. 

“Yes!” Kili exclaimed.

Fili nodded enthusiastically, though he couldn’t speak around his mouthful of fruit and pastry. 

“I will bring you some then.” She tried smiling at the brothers, but the expression felt wrong somehow. So, she turned and walked back down the alley to the market, waving at her mother to catch her attention. Hild came over at a run and, before she could say anything, Astrid said, “I thought I saw a cat.”

Hild rolled her eyes, her shoulders slumping. She put her hands on her hips and looked down at her daughter, the exasperation clean on her face. “Astrid… Come on. Let us get back. We have a lot of work to do today.”

“I know.”

Astrid took her basket back from her mother and once again fell in behind her as they made their way back to the wagons. Bran had the main wagon open and there were several dwarves gathered around, waiting for their turn to purchase goods or services. Astrid and Hild moved to the firepit set up between the wagons and set about their baking. A table had been placed on the ground beside the pit, and a specially designed cover that would make the firepit function more like an oven sat on the ground beside the flames. Knowing her role, Astrid climbed onto her stool and started sorting out the ingredients as her mother began peeling and chopping the apples they’d need. 

The morning passed quietly and quickly and by early afternoon, they were finished all the baking that had to be done. The air around the wagons smelled sweet and fruity and Astrid’s stomach was grumbling with a fierce noise. Once they’d cleaned up the pots and pans and Astrid had eaten a quick meal of cold chicken and sliced tomato, she snuck around to where the desserts were cooling, waiting to be sold. She grabbed as many of the apple cakes as she could carry and bolted back towards town and Dis’s house. 

“Astrid!” someone hissed. 

For a moment, she feared it was Dis, but she recognized the voice as Fili’s once the fright had passed. She changed direction quickly and ran around the back of their house to where Fili and Kili where sitting, cleaning and tending their weapons by the look of it. 

“Here,” she said, passing the cakes to Fili, who was standing beside her. 

He immediately passed two to Kili; Astrid saw she’d grabbed five of the cakes and felt bad it was not an even number. Fili looked at the fifth cake and tossed it to Astrid, who caught it and dropped to the grass, her legs folded beneath her, to start nibbling at it. 

“Thank you,” she muttered. 

Fili shrugged. “You stole the cakes—least we could do.”

“They’re an apology.”

Kili snorted. “Apology by becoming a criminal.” He laughed again when Astrid glared at him. “Though these are delicious. Apology accepted.”

“Agreed.”

Astrid felt laughter bubble over her lips, real laughter. She felt better than she had since climbing that tree. “I will not steal any more desserts from my mother though.”

“As long as you do not do anything else you need to apologize for, I don’t see why that would be necessary.” Fili’s smile was somewhat smug. “Although, we could use you as an accomplice…” 

Astrid laughed again, though she wasn’t entirely sure if Fili was being serious or not.


	11. Lost in the Dark

She didn’t remember how exactly she’d ended up so deep in one of the mines. Astrid had been playing hide and seek with Fili and Kili, her mother finally having recanted her punishment and allowed her to spend her days away from the wagons. She remembered thinking the mine would be a good place to hide from the brothers, but she had only intended to go just inside, to hide behind some crates she’d seen from the entrance, but for some reason, she’d decided wandering deeper into the gloom would be better. Perhaps it had been the sounds of Fili and Kili looking for her that had driven her deeper into the mine, but now she was alone in the darkness, scared, and unsure which direction would lead her back to the light. 

Astrid stuck her hand out in front of her and walked until she found a wall. She slid down to the ground, her back against the side of the mine. It felt as if the darkness was closing in around her. Her breaths had grown loud, almost like pants or gasps, and her heartbeat hammered in her ears, her heart against her ribcage. She wrapped her arms around her knees, holding them close to her chest.

It had been stupid to hide in the mine, especially since Astrid was sure no one had seen her enter it. She could be stuck in there for days, alone in the dark. Briefly, she considered getting to her feet and wandering in search of the exit again, but knew that would be a bad choice; she could end up more lost, deeper in the mountain. 

Her only consolation was she was not up another tree. 

She took a few long, deep breaths, keeping the panic at bay, though she did not let go of her legs or move away from the wall. Part of her wanted to speak her thoughts out loud, but the sound of anything, even her own voice, echoing in the darkness would scare her more, so she pressed her face into her knees and contented herself with thinking of what she would do when she was free of the mine.

Astrid was unsure of how long she sat there. Every little noise made her jump, and she thought she saw shadows darker than black moving around her, though she knew she had to be imagining the sights. She was shaking and there were tears streaming down her cheeks, but still she didn’t move. In her mind’s eye, she pictured the sun setting over the settlement, her mother and father out looking for her, possibly with Fili and Kili to help, or Dwalin, or Dis. She willed them to check the mine.

Why had she picked a mine where no one was working that day? 

When Astrid was sure she was doomed to be stuck in the mine at least overnight, she heard a different noise, one echoing sharply around her. It was heavy and repetitive, like footsteps, but who would be looking for her here? Keeping one hand on the wall, Astrid pushed herself to her feet, trying in vain to see anything in the darkness, to define any recognizable shapes. The sound grew louder and she grew scared. She pushed herself back against the wall until the rock dug in painfully; she held on with her fingers, skin scraping away as she fought to keep her sweaty palms gripping the stone. She knew her hands would be bloody, but she didn’t care. She was terrified. 

What if it was a bear? Or a goblin? An orc? A troll?

Why had she come into the mine to hide?

She squeezed her eyes shut as the noise grew ever louder, some twisted logic in her mind telling her it would be better if she didn’t see the end coming. 

“Astrid! Astrid, can you hear me?”

That voice—she knew that voice. 

“Prince Thorin!” she cried, her voice cracking with relief as she stumbled away from the wall. 

“Astrid! Stay where you are, I will find you.”

Even though she tried to keep it from happening, a small whimper escaped her lips and she felt fresh tears sliding down her cheeks. “I don’t like it down here.”

“No, I expect you do not.” Thorin’s voice was coming closer and Astrid badly wanted to run towards it, but she made herself stay still, feet rooted to the ground. “This is turning out to be quite the eventful visit. I do not recall there being this much trouble the last time your parents visited us,” he said with amusement.

Thorin was right in front of her now, so Astrid reached out, another sob breaking through when her fingers found the cloth of his tunic. She latched on and pulled herself close. To her surprise, Thorin picked her up. Astrid wrapped her arms around his neck and she had enough presence of mind left to make sure she didn’t pull his hair. His hand on her back was heavy and comforting, and even though she knew he was irritated with her, he gave her quiet words of reassurance as he started moving back through the darkness. After only a few minutes of walking, Astrid felt safe and calm, though the darkness still surrounded them. 

“Can you see in the dark?” she asked. 

She felt Thorin’s laughter, but she didn’t hear it. “I can see fairly well in the dark, yes, but I know these mines like the back of my hand, so it would not be difficult to find my way even if I could not see.” 

“How well can you see?”

“Outlines and shadows.”

Astrid made a noise of acknowledgement and squinted into the darkness over Thorin’s shoulder, trying to make out anything. Even after so long in the gloom, the most she could see was what she thought might be the edge of a mining car or crate, but there was no way to be sure. When light started to filter back into the mine and she could make out definite objects, Astrid felt much better. She shifted in Thorin’s grasp so she could see where they were going and smiled when she saw the square of light marking the entrance to the mine. Back in the sunlight, Thorin set her on her feet, but she threw her arms around him again immediately. 

“Thank you,” she said, her words muffled against his tunic.

Somewhat hesitantly, Thorin reached down and placed his hand on her head, ruffling her hair slightly when he pulled his hand back. “Stay away from the mines from now on, all right? They are no place for young ones to play.”

Astrid nodded as she stepped back. Someone else called her name and she turned to see Fili and Kili standing there, relief plain on their faces; she was sure it had been Fili who’d gone to Thorin for help. “You did not tell my mother?” 

Thorin shook his head. “I believe she has worried enough about you.”

Astrid looked at her feet, her lips bunched as the shame washed through her. “Thank you,” she said again. 

The dwarf prince nodded before turning his attention to Fili and Kili. “No more hide and seek.”

“Yes uncle,” they said together.

Under the watchful eye of Thorin, Astrid fell in between Fili and Kili as they headed back towards the village.


	12. A Bear in the Hills

“This isn’t fun, this is boring. You told me this would be fun.”

Dwalin chuckled as he cast his line out into the water again, Astrid pouting beside him. 

They were a ways away from the village, by a stream winding its way through the foothills of the Blue Mountains. It was quiet and warm in the sunshine. Bran and Hild were cleaning up the camp and packing the wagons with the goods purchased from the dwarves, goods they would sell in the other settlements of Middle Earth, and had been glad of it when Dwalin offered to take Astrid with him when he, Fili, and Kili went fishing that morning. Astrid was never very helpful when it came time to pack—she had an insatiable urge to go through everything new they were loading into the wagons and it took her about three times longer than anyone else to get anything done. They were planning on leaving the day after tomorrow early in the morning and it was likely the imminent departure had something to do with Astrid’s foul mood. 

“Sit and enjoy the sun, Astrid.”

“No. I will be sitting all the time in the wagon. I do not want to sit!”

Dwalin sighed and turned his attention back to the river; he could see the silver flicker of the fish swimming by, but none of them were biting. “As long as you stay where I can see you, you do not have to sit.”

Astrid stuck her tongue out at him before dropping onto the ground beside him and shuffling closer to the river while sitting so she wouldn’t fall in. It wasn’t a river that moved overly fast, but she was small enough and the current strong enough that it could be dangerous. She started picking through the smooth stones lining the bank, looking for the different coloured ones, and the ones with strange markings or shapes. Her quest took her down the river as she filled the folded edge of her tunic with her bounty. Every once in a while, she would pause and look out at the fish, or back down the river to make sure she could still see Dwalin and Fili and Kili. 

Eventually, the pile of rocks she’d gathered in her shirt became too heavy for her to carry comfortably. She found a suitable patch of grass and stashed her collection there before returning to her search. When she returned the bank, movement caught her eye in the weeds. Slowly, she crept forward and peered into the grass, a bright smile taking over her face as she spotted a rabbit drinking from the river. A small breath of laughter fell from her lips before she could stop it and the rabbit perked up, its ears turning towards the sound and its head following. For a split second, Astrid made eye contact with the rabbit and then it darted away. 

Following one the urges that oh-so-often got her in trouble, Astrid took off after it, abandoning her collection of pretty stones. 

She was scrambling up a rock after the small mammal when she heard the dwarves start after her. Dwalin was calling her name, and about the third time he called, she brought herself to a stop. It wasn’t because Dwalin sounded angry, however. 

It was because, on the other side of the massive rock, sniffing around the grass for food, was a bear. A great big, dark brown bear. 

Astrid moved slowly onto her stomach so she could peek over the edge of the rock and still watch the bear. It hadn’t noticed her, or if it had, it didn’t care. It was more interested in the berries it had found. Astrid liked the snuffling noises it made. 

“Astrid!” Dwalin called. “What do you think you are doing?”

She turned around and put her finger to her lips before gesturing down. Dwalin crept up beside her, on his stomach as well, followed by Fili and Kili, both making noises of astonishment.

“Your knack for finding danger is astounding little one,” Dwalin said quietly. 

“I was chasing a rabbit. I did not go looking for danger.”

“And yet you seem to find it anyway.”

Astrid smiled at Dwalin and then turned back to the bear, who had moved into the water and was watching the silver fish flickering about in the water. She had an odd desire to move closer to the animal, but knew that would be bad. It was the same sort of urge that had pushed her father into the mine, the same sort of restless energy that made her want to do most of the crazy things she did. It was an urge that grew in strength when she was mad or upset. She was upset right then—she didn’t want to leave the dwarf settlement. She liked it there, though she had to admit to some excitement to see The Shire, to see the next place they’d go. 

As if sensing the thoughts in her head, Dwalin reached over and placed a heavy hand on her arm, effectively pinning her to the rock. “Let’s head back down the river.”

She almost opened her mouth to protest, but nodded slowly instead. 

Fili and Kili slid down the rock first and started back to where they’d left their fishing gear. When Dwalin and Astrid starting moving, the bear’s head snapped up and looked right at them and, despite her earlier desire to get closer, she almost screamed. The bear’s teeth were visible around black lips, yellow and pointed. It snorted, drool dripping from those teeth and lips and Astrid fought the urge to turn tail and run. She knew that would be bad, worse.

After a moment however, the bear turned away and Dwalin and Astrid heaved sighs of relief at the same time. 

“Maybe fishing would be fun,” Astrid said once their feet had hit solid ground again. 

Dwalin chuckled and ruffled her hair. “I thought you might say that.”


	13. Traveller's Tales

“Thank you for offering to help. I had not realized how much the wagons needed a coat of paint until today.”

“It is not a problem,” Fili said as he dipped the brush into the green paint and lifted the brush back to the boards of the wagon.

The existing paint was faded and peeling from years on the road; it was one of those tasks that was spoken off often but took longer than planned to get around to actually completing it. Hild had been rather shocked to see the state of their wagons in the sunlight. Once everything had been packed away, there had been nothing keeping her from noticing. She and Bran were painting the other wagon, a dark blue that had been lying around the dwarf settlement, and Fili, Kili, and Astrid were tackling the main wagon, a dark green—the same colour it had always been. It was the wagon the peoples of Middle Earth recognized as belonging to the tinker. 

“This is more enjoyable than whatever mother would have had us doing,” Kili joked.

“She will just have us complete whatever task it was tomorrow.”

Kili shrugged, a smile on his face. “That is tomorrow.” He looked at Astrid, who was standing on a stool touching up the designs around the window frame: vines and flowers and birds and some things Kili couldn’t make out. It looked as if the designs had originally been done by Astrid when she was three or so. “Where are you and your parents headed tomorrow?” he asked. 

Astrid pulled her tongue back in her mouth—she had tendency to stick it out when she was concentrating—and pulled her brush away from the boards. “The Shire, I think.”

“Have you ever been there before?” 

“When I was a baby. I do not remember it at all.”

Fili leaned back so he look at Astrid around his brother’s back. “Where have you been that you remember?”

The little girl gave a little sigh as she went back to painting. She didn’t like thinking about leaving—she never did, when she had met people she liked—and she wasn’t overly fond of thinking of the places she’d been. Every time they revisited somewhere her father had been, he always had a story of how it had changed. “The last place we were was a village by the ocean,” she said after a few minutes. “It smelled like salt and it was cold, but the people were nice and there were lots of dogs.” Astrid paused in her recollection to carefully paint over a vine on the window frame. “Before that, it was tiny places between Rohan and the village by the ocean.”

“What was Rohan like?”

A small smile crossed Astrid’s face at the memories. Of the all the places she remembered—which weren’t many; before Rohan, she only had fuzzy memories of Gondor—Rohan was her favourite. “There were horses everywhere and music and huge fires in the main building and—” She shook her head. “I liked it there.”

Fili huffed. “I am not sure how I feel knowing a child of so few years has seen more of the world than I have.”

Astrid laughed, which had been Fili’s intent. He reached over and ruffled her hair, to which she responded by swiping her paintbrush across Fili’s hand. He gasped in mock horror before dabbing his brush against her cheek. She yelped, and yelped again when Kili repeated the process on the other cheek. With a playful snarl, she leapt at Kili and managed a stroke of paint on his neck. He backed away as she advanced again, laughing. 

“Now, you three,” Bran said as he came around the corner of the wagon, “I would like it if some of the paint ended up on the wagon.”

The trio laughed, but returned to their task. For a few minutes, they worked in silence, before Astrid handed her brush to Kili. 

“You two can add something if you want,” she said somewhat tentatively, gesturing at the window frame. “It should be different.”

She had changed the pattern already. There were no more flowers or birds anymore, just twisting vines and leaves. Kili stepped forward with the brush and painted more of the vines and leaves, trickling off the window frame and onto the boards of the wagon. Fili took the brush from his brother and painted something in dwarvish runes along the bottom, a common saying that wished good luck and happiness. With the still-visible yet faded birds and flowers around the edges, the pattern had taken on something of a sad tone, but Astrid liked it. She smiled at the dwarves, the paint on her cheeks cracking and flaking a bit. 

With the designs around the window done, Astrid picked up one of the larger brushes and the three continued to apply the dark green to the outside of the wagon. Bran started singing at some point, and Hild and Astrid joined in, Fili and Kili humming along since they did not know the words. When that song had finished, Fili and Kili took up a dwarf tone which Astrid found enormously pleasant to listen to. Bran knew the words to that one and he sang along. This didn’t seem to surprise anyone, but then, Bran had spent time with the dwarves before. 

When the chore was finally done and they had eaten a lunch prepared by Hild, the trio set off towards the practice fields to kill the time while Bran and HIld made final preparations and Astrid tried not to think about leaving. After a few steps, she turned and ran back to the wagons, grabbed something and slipped it in her belt before running to catch up with Fili and Kili again. When they looked at her curiously, she just shrugged and started skipping ahead of them.


	14. A Gift

There were several others around the practice fields that afternoon. As Fili and Kili made their way through, looking for a suitable place to spar, Astrid following behind, she kept her head on a swivel, watching the dwarves practicing with all sorts of weapons. She was fascinated, and she wanted to learn, but knew she was too young—or at least her parents would think she was too young. Eventually, Fili and Kili settled on an area, located on the edge of the large clearing, near some trees, and Astrid settled herself on the ground to watch as they bickered about which weapons to start with. 

Astrid turned and watched the nearest pair of dwarves, who were fighting with war axes like Dwalin used, though each dwarf only had one. They moved with a bizarre sort of grace for being squat and low to the ground as dwarves were. The axes, blunted for training, moved almost too fast to follow and connected with resounding thuds Astrid felt.

Beyond them, another dwarf was training with a long spear and a wooden dummy. He moved quite differently from the dwarves with axes, darting in and out, with short bursts of speed and immense strength behind the thrusts of his spear. 

She could hear the thrumming of bow strings in the distance as well, but her views of the archers was obscured by the others training. 

Behind her, she heard the first clangs of battle and turned again to find Fili and Kili practicing with swords, Fili with two shorter blades and Kili with one about the length of his arm. They were laughing as they moved around each other, their movements almost easy, but no less strong or deadly, not that they were trying to kill each other. The padding they’d added to their weapons would keep any serious injury from happening, but it would still be possible to seriously injure each other. 

Again, they moved differently from all the others dwarves she’d seen training. Fili moved smoother than Kili, though Kili was slightly faster, but then he would have to be to avoid both of Fili’s blades. Fili’s control of his dual blades was astounding, but then, Astrid had been in awe of Dwalin’s dual-wielding as well. Watching Fili and Kili spar was highly entertaining and, probably to keep their audience interested, they kept throwing in more elaborate, and possibly quite useless, moves. Astrid smiled and laughed and wondered at how, in her short time in the dwarvish settlement, she had become friends with the brothers. 

When they’d finished the first match—it looked like Fili had won, however they’d decided winning would be accomplished—they took a break, both taking long drinks from skins of water. Fili dropped one of his short swords and picked up a blade nearly identical to Kili’s and they were at it again. Fili’s movements weren’t as sure this time around, but it was no less entertaining to watch, although they did stop periodically so Kili could show Fili a different way to swing the blade, or position the rest of his body. When they finished with that match, they both took up dual blades and repeated the process. Kili was not as adept as his brother at picking up the different fighting style, but that didn’t mean he didn’t give it his all. 

Sitting in the warm sunshine and watching the sparring, Astrid found herself dozing. She had cleaned the paint off her face when Fili and Kili had stopped to pick up their weapons—or rather, Dis had cleaned the paint off her face—and she was quiet comfortable in the grass. She laid back and watched the clouds pass overhead. 

The next thing she knew, Fili and Kili were sitting on the ground beside her and the light had changed. The sun was setting. 

She shifted into a sitting position and looked curiously around. “How long did I sleep?”

“Just a couple of hours,” Fili said. “It is almost time for dinner.”

Astrid shook her head and rubbed at her eyes, ridding herself of the last bits of sleep clinging to her brain. Fili got to his feet and moved to where their weapons lay, started to gather his things. Astrid looked at Kili, who was removing the padding from his weapons, and then she pulled the knife she’d stolen from him out of her belt—it was the item she had run back to grab before they’d come to the training grounds. She shuffled along the ground until she was sitting beside Kili.

“This is yours,” she said, extending the knife towards him. “I took it when I… cut your hair.” 

Kili took the knife by the handle and looked at it curiously for a few seconds before flipping it over in his hand and handing it back to her, handle first. “You can keep it,” he said. 

She smiled as she took the knife. “Why?”

Kili shrugged. “It is a gift. You are quite the troublemaker, but you are not so bad.” He returned his smile, a crooked gesture and Astrid’s smile grew. 

She elbowed his arm playfully. “Thank you Kili.” She slipped the knife back into her belt. 

“You should really have a proper sheath for that though. You do not want to hurt yourself accidentally.” He reached over and grabbed the belt that held his quiver. From the opposite end, he pulled off the sheath Astrid had originally taken the knife from and tossed it to her. “And maybe get your father to show you how to use it.” 

Astrid removed her belt so she could thread the sheath onto it, and then slid the knife home before looping the belt around her waist again. “Maybe.”

Kili reached over and gave her shoulder a squeeze. “We should get you back to the wagons. I imagine your parents would like you to get a good night’s rest before you leave tomorrow.”

Astrid nodded and rubbed at her face again. Kili got to his feet, his weapons belt slung over one shoulder, and helped her to her feet before they joined Fili and started back. Astrid hung back from the dwarves a bit as they walked because she was overcome with a sudden wave of sadness at the departure that was looming closer and closer.


	15. Unlikely Friends

The day dawned bright and mild, the sunrise all pink and silver with edges of gold. Astrid knew because she was up before the sun, helping hitch the ponies to the wagons. All four of the animals were very-well rested and a antsy to get moving, stamping their hooves in the dust and snorting, their breath steaming in the air. Bran and Hild were triple-checking that the wagons were stocked properly, everything secured and ready for travel and Astrid, she was sitting on the roof of one of the wagons, watching the sun climb higher into the sky. 

It was from this vantage point she saw the dwarves approaching. She climbed swiftly down from the top of the wagon—she was shaking a little bit from being up high, even though the roof of the wagon wasn’t anywhere she hadn’t been before—and walked around the meet those who had come to see them off. She’d spotted Dwalin and Fili and Kili from the distance, and thought maybe Dis and Thorin had come as well, along with some of the dwarves from the market, the ones who had dealt with her parents. Astrid remained by the ponies as her parents came up behind her. 

She watched Thorin approach her parents and didn’t see Dwalin come up behind her. She gave a small yelp when he picked her up, much like their first meeting, but instead of struggling, she just turned around and wrapped her arms around his neck.

“I would tell you to stay out of trouble, but I know that would be a hopeless request,” he said, giving her a squeeze. “So I will just tell you to be careful and to listen to your parents.” 

Astrid pulled back so she could see him and smiled. “I will, Dwalin.”

“Good.”

Dwalin lifted Astrid up so she could sit on his shoulders as she smiled, giving her a good look at those who had come to say goodbye and at the tattoos on Dwalin’s head. She traced the designs with one finger. “Do they mean anything?” she asked as Dwalin headed back towards the wagons.

“They are reminders of the battles I have fought.”

“I hope you do not have to fight any more battles or else you will run out of room.”

Dwalin chuckled, but said nothing. Astrid swung down from his shoulders when they reached the wagons and perched on the ledge around the steps that would lead down the ground when unfolded. Her legs hung over the edge and she kicked her feet back and forth. 

“Maybe we will meet again, little one,” Dwalin said.

“I hope so.”

Astrid smiled up at the big dwarf and watched him walk away. Her eyes found Fili and Kili and saw as they broke away from where they’d been talking to Bran and Hild with their mother and Thorin and joined Astrid; Dwalin took their place in the conversation. Both of the dwarves were smiling as they approached, though the expressions were a little sad.

“It will not be the same around here without you, little one,” Kili said.

“No it will not—it will be peaceful.”

Astrid kicked out, trying to hit Fili’s leg, but the blond dwarf moved out the way, laughing. She hopped down off the wagon and ran towards Fili, who turned on his heel and ran, headed around the ponies, Astrid chasing him, running as fast as she could. They were running down the back of the wagons when Kili stepped in and grabbed Astrid under the arms, picking her up and cutting off her pursuit of his brother. She shrieked with laughter as Kili tucked her under his arm and struggled, though not too much since she didn’t want to fall to the ground. 

“It’s about time we won one,” Kili said as he put her back on the ledge near the steps. 

Astrid righter herself just in time for Fili to ruffle her hair excessively, turning the dark brown locks to a rat’s nest on top of her head. She batted his hands away and tried to fix it. Kili and Fili dropped onto the ledge on either side of her and leaned back. Astrid finally succeeded in getting her back tamed enough that she could see and she smiled at the brothers, one after the other. 

“What do you say we keep the tally running until the next time we meet?”

Astrid looked at Fili, her standard bright grin on her face. “I think I will still win.”

The boys roared with laughter and Astrid kept smiling. She ducked under the hand that reached towards her head—she wasn’t sure who it belonged to—and jumped onto the ground. Fili and Kili followed and they spent a few more moments chasing each other around before Bran and Hild started towards the wagons and Astrid knew it was time to leave. 

She stumbled back a step as she came to a stop. Her eyes were itching, but she wasn’t going to cry. She’d left places before. This was no different. Except that this was the first place she’d had friends, people who wanted to play or teach her things, people who put up with her, regardless of how annoying she was, of how she acted out. She liked the dwarves. They were loud and fun and stubborn. The five year old shook her head and moved towards Fili and Kili, who were standing close together, close enough for Astrid to jump up and hook her arms around their necks at the same time. They laughed and caught her before kneeling to be within better reach. 

“Thank you,” she said quietly. 

She gave them a hug and then took a step back. With one last smile, she climbed into the wagon seat beside her father and they were off. Astrid peeked around the corner and waved, a small laugh escaping her lips when her friends waved back.


End file.
